Shopping Trip
by ThisStatementIsFalse
Summary: Hm... The RED base is looking a little bland… maybe the team should go shopping. Seventh Misadventures of the RED Team spinoff
1. Moving Out

**Hey guys! :D**

**Yup, it's another edition in the Misadventures of the RED Team series :p**

**Wanted to get this up before the end of the month, and _this counts!_**

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Chapter One – Moving out

~RED BASE~

The RED Engineer wasn't entirely certain why he'd chosen the Scout and Pyro to accompany him.

Maybe it was partially because his first choice, the Sniper, had politely and efficiently refused to go _there _ever again.

It was partially because the Demoman would just drink the entire freaking time they were there.

It was partially because the Soldier still hadn't gotten to grips with the 'no weapons in public' policy.

It was partially because of the heavy Heavy's heavy eating habits.

It was partially because Medic had tried some kind of medical experiment and was easily higher than Pyro at the moment.

And it was partially because, even though he was too nice to say so, frankly Engy thought the Spy was an ass.

Well, that was pretty much why then.

The three of them were in front of Teleporter Three. I should explain. Sometime between stories the Engineer set up a network of teleporters linked to all the places in their epic adventure in Misadventures of the RED Team 2.

Section Three, if you remember/even read it, was the one with the department store.

And, this excessive explanation later, I can tell you that the REDs needed to go there because they had no furniture. Personally, we believe this was due to Soldier and his rocket launchers.

Well, Pyro just believes in magic. Nothing else.

Nevertheless, with plans to get the stuff and worry about the whole money thing later, here they were. Engy, ever practical, was telling his two companions how it was going to be cold all the way over in Section Three, and Scout would probably need something besides his T-shirt.

"What," Scout scoffed, "ya tryin' to be a father figure or somethin'?"

The Engineer blinked when he realised he kinda had done.

"Damn author and her headcanon…" he muttered, shaking a fist at the sky. Still, he asked Scout nicely to go put on a jumper. Exasperated, the runner sighed overdramatically;

"Fiiine, I'll get the fast learner." He jogged away through the base. Engy wondered what kind of weird slang that was before remembering 'fast learner' was the name of Scout's undershirt.

Pyro tugged on the defence class's sleeve for attention and said something, sounding distressed.

"Ya feel a sense of all consumin' forebodin'?" Engy translated, quite casually. "Interestin'."

Pyro nodded, agreeing, then promptly forgot the feeling and watched Balloonicorn, Reindoonicorn, and their baby Balloondoonicorn frolic overhead.

~UPSTAIRS~

In life, there are an awful lot of 'what ifs'.

What if you hadn't started reading this? Then, you wouldn't be reading this.

What if it hadn't been cold in the distant Section Three? Then Engy wouldn't have- wait, that's its own point.

What if Engy hadn't been such a practical bro and told Scout to get a jumper? Then Scout wouldn't have gone upstairs.

And then, ooh then, he wouldn't have bumped into Soldier in the hallway. CUE SOURCE OF FOREBODING.

"And where are you off to, maggot?" Soldier asked, making sure he was standing further up the uneven corridor so he would appear taller. Scout jerked a thumb over one shoulder, indicating that-a-way.

"Gettin' a shirt, cuz apparently Section Three's cold. Me, Py, and Engy are furniture shoppin'." Incidentally, that was probably most sane sentence he ever uttered. "Also, I think there should be duck show jumping." Oh. Never mind.

Soldier's expression visibly darkened.

"Oh. Okay. Yeah. You guys have fun. The three of you. Yourselves. Yeah. Bye." He abruptly pivoted to face the nearest wall, pulled out his rocket launcher and blew a hole in it. "ABSCOND." He yelled, stepping through.

"…That was weird." Scout observed, derping out. He shrugged it off and dove into the rubbish dump that was his room, resurfacing moments later wearing his fast learner.

With his trademark speed it didn't take Scout long to rejoin Pyro and Engy, and the three of them stepped through the teleporter.

~MEANWHILE, STILL UPSTAIRS~

Soldier got grumpy pretty easily, especially when there weren't any BLUs around for ass-kicking. And now there was _extra _cause for grumpiness, because his BEST FREAKIN' BUDDY Scout was going out _without him._

Wow. Just wow.

"I'll show him." Soldier suddenly vowed, then, turning to the forth wall, he added, "I'LL SHOW ALL YOU MAGGOTS."

(The author does not have responsibility for any insults Soldier may throw in your direction.)

~BACK DOWN THEM STAIRS~

The Demoman and Sniper were in the rec room, the former break dancing on the table and the latter sitting upside down on one of the chairs.

Both of them were very, very drunk.

Their somewhat undignified hysterical laughter was interrupted when the roof blew up and rubble landed in a convenient wee circle around them.

"Tha' was close!" Demo belched, laughing again without the intention of stopping. He did stop however when Soldier crash-landed on top of him. "Ow."

At that point, Sniper hiccupped loudly and fell backwards over his chair, so only his feet were visible above it. Soldier heaved himself up, strode over there, and dragged Sniper upright. Then, with all the authority in his system, the offense class clambered up Rubble Mountain to address his fellow mercs.

"ANNOUNCEMENT!" he began, "We have been DITCHED. Ditched like when you're playing Medic without the quick-fix and that damn Soldier rocket jumps away from you when you're _all alone _behind enemy lines and there's a Heavy there what is with that I mean JESUS!?"

Of course, Sniper and Demo didn't really get any of that, but they realised Soldier was about to rope them into going on some dumb-assed adventure. So they ran.

"ARGH GOD SOLDIER YOU BROKE ME LEGS AGAIN!"

…Okay, 'run' may have been a slight overstatement; more like 'stagger two paces only to have Soldier karate chop both legs into uselessness'.

"Fine," Demo said a moment later, "We'll go. Weee'll go."

~THE INFIRMARY~

"So, vhat exactly happened zhere?" Medic was asking, having repaired the Sniper and Demoman's injuries- but he forgot to make them sober.

"Well, Scoot, Pyro an' Engy are goin' furniture shoppin'. Withoot us." Demo began, falling off the infirmary bed so Sniper had to continue;

"So us and SOLDIER-" he burped loudly saying the merc's name- "are gonna go appliance shoppin'."

Medic looked up sharply at them.

"Oh? Zhe three of you? Just- okay. Fine. Have a good time." The doctor pointedly opened the infirmary door and gestured for them to remove their butts from the room.

Once alone, the support class decided to do a little pacing. His doves accompanied him overhead, forming a little white cloud of feathers just under the roof. It's not like he was even the tiniest bit interested in shopping.

But… it would have been nice to be _asked, _y'know?

"Zhis means war." Medic stated, receiving something of an encouraging brofist from Archimedes as he strode from the room. "HEAVY! SPY! GET OVER HERE!"

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**Right guys, updates are not gonna be as quick as usual, because**

**THE EXAMS ARE NIGH!**

**Sorry about that, I'll do my best :)**

**Incidently, if you were at DOJ-CON, hi! Maybe I saw you!**

**Thanks for reading!**


	2. Gets Less Manly From Here

**Aw, you guys are amazing! Thanks so much for the reviews! :D**

**Got a bit of a study-leave gap, so hopefully updates will be a bit quicker :p**

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Chapter Two – It Only Gets Less Manly From Here

~SMALL CITY (SECTION THREE)~

With a science-fiction-y whoosh, the teleporter in the city whirred to life and spun like helicopter blades, kicking up an alarming shower of sparks and dazzling lightshow.

One after the other, the RED Engineer, Pyro and Scout staggered out of the machine and stumbled onto the pavement. Beside them loomed the back of the department store, and the also the dumpster Scout had just fallen into.

"Engy…" Scout's muffled voice came from the depths of the dumpster, "Why's dis here?"

Engy shrugged, leaning casually on the edge of the skip;

"Had to hide the teleporter, son. So, here it is," he replied simply, watching Pyro unsuccessfully attempt to help its buddy out. When the two of them got well and truly stuck Engy just sighed, summoned his ENGY POWERS and picked up the dumpster.

With casual ease he flipped the thing upside down, sending his fellow mercs sprawling a little roughly on the ground.

Slightly in shock, the pair of them wordlessly followed Engy around to the front of the building.

~TOWN (SECTION SEVEN)~

Soldier, Sniper, and Demo all flew out of a different teleporter at the same time, attempting to pull off sick ninja poses but merely landing in a heap, crushing each other. The three morons scrambled up, only to abruptly slide sideways.

"WHY THE HELL ARE WE ON A ROOF!?" Soldier managed to scream in the three seconds it took them to hit the ground.

Distantly, as whisper on the wind, they heard Engy's voice saying, '_Had to hide the teleporters…'_

Which was both creepy and kinda cool.

Years of what was ideally physical abuse gave the REDs the ability to regain their feet with little bother, and they had a wee look around themselves.

Town (number seven), if you recall, was the little place by the sea where the mercs jacked a boat. As a result, they didn't spend too much time there, which gives me a valid excuse to say there was in fact an appliance store there.

How the Soldier of all people knew this, the world will never know.

~CITY (SECTION ONE)~

And finally, Medic, Heavy and a slightly pissed off Spy made the teleporter transaction from the base to the city, narrowly avoiding a blunder straight into the walls of their respawn.

One last look back at Misadventures of the RED Team 2, kids!

These three had decided they would go food shopping, and the ideal place for that sort of activity was the shop that Spy got a part-time job in. The one with the top-hat-clad-fish-on-a-bicycle.

Medic made sure not to tell Spy this until the last possible moment, due to the whole traumatising 'getting maced' fiasco.

Either way, the mercs stepped clear of the spawn room and headed down the worn track to the city. There was a crap-ton of looming buildings, from nice opulent structures to towers of complete rubbish, so the whole finding the shop thing proved a small problem.

"Ach, how difficult can it be?" Medic asked no one in particular, flouncing away like he was off to see the wizard. (Not Merasmus.)

If only he'd been aware those were famous last words.

~SMALL CITY (THREE)~

"Wait a minute." Engy said, suddenly stopping short in the department store doorway. "Didn't we destroy this buildin' before…?"

"Nah, course not," Scout hand-waved, sauntering inside. Engy hesitated, a mask of suspicion clouding his features, then shrugged and entered the shop, Pyro tagging along.

Pyro, in fact, was giddier than usual; it was baby Balloondoonicorn's first day outside of the base, and the merc and parents couldn't be more proud. The four of them pranced along, singing a lovely little ditty about magic, much to the confusion of… well, everyone else.

Meanwhile, Scout was pick-pocketing the shopping list from Engy and generally making a fool of himself as he jumped all over the public place.

Oh yes. Civvie interactions.

Fortunately it was early Wednesday morning, so there weren't too many folks about. Unfortunately, that meant people there were instantly targets of the RED's insanity. Scout selected one such civvie at random and bounded obnoxiously into his field of vision.

"Heeey pally," he pseudo-greeted, "Mind if I stand on yer head so I can find stuff? Thanks." With nary a thought for anything the merc vaulted onto the guy's head and scouted the shop.

From where he was trying to stop Pyro climb some cardboard boxes, the Engineer saw what Scout was up to and scarpered over there.

"Now Scout," he said sternly, "Do ya recall Bein' In Public 101?" He briefly addressed the confused civvie "Hang on sir, Ah'll have 'im off in a sec."

"Just tryin' ta be helpful! Jeez," Scout pouted, not moving. Until he looked at the far corner. "HOLY CRAP IS THAT A BOX FORT!?"

One double jump, one loud crash and two confused men left standing there later, Scout and Pyro were hiding in a cardboard box fortress.

Engy started to wonder if this had been a good idea.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

The town by the sea was nice, quiet and peaceful, so it was the perfect place for three aggressive mercenaries to party crash. I MEAN, perfectly easy to find the appliance store. Soldier led the way because he was actually sober.

"Oh we are gonna show. Them. Up!" he informed the others, "Fall in, men!"

"F-fall in wha?" Demo asked, giggling like a little sissie, "_the seeeeaaaa?"_

He and Sniper abruptly changed course and toddled toward the water. Soldier, interestingly, actually noticed the danger, and tried to stop them.

_But they homed._

He turned them around. He pointed them in the direction – any direction – away from the sea. But they turned back. No matter what Solly did, the Sniper and Demo kept their one-track-mind approach like baby turtles for dat ocean.

Oh my God.

Imagine all the mercs as turtles.

Anyway, Soldier eventually just smacked them both upside the head with his shovel and dragged them to the appliance store.

~CITY (ONE)~

"I WON'T GO BACK! I WON'T GO BACK!"

"Honestly, Spy, it's just a shop."

"I'LL NEVER GO BACK! NEVER!"

Medic sighed wearily, scowling at the upside-down flailing Spy. Heavy, holding him by a single foot, casually walked on. He mentally tallied the awkward stares they received; well into the teens after just four minutes.

By some freak chance they had pretty much headed straight for the supermarket, a fact Spy unfortunately picked up on. Hence the whole 'Spy can fly but no really he can't' thing.

So that was all very well, but now they had a major, daunting challenge ahead.

_An automatic door._

"Was zhis here before?" Medic frowned suspiciously at the door, adjusting his specs. Spy was too busy quaking in terror to reply, or even form a coherent sentence. All of a sudden, Heavy straightened up and cracked his neck.

"I WILL GO FIRST." He took a bold step in slow motion toward the door, ignoring the little voice at the back of his mind telling him there was heroism and blatant stupidity. One more pace. He could do it.

The Heavy Weapons Guy shuffled into position. Now came the tricky bit.

The door slowly slid open…

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**The most non-dramatic cliffhanger you ever did see :p**

**Thanks for reading! :)**


	3. Take Cover, Civvies

**Yeah, so**

**I drew Sniper as a turtle**

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Chapter Three – Take Cover, Civvies

~SMALL CITY (THREE)~

The Engineer had literally dragged Pyro and Scout out of their box fort and half way across the department store. In the ten seconds it had been in Scout's possession, the shopping list had vanished to Administrator-knows-where. Engy decided they'd go find chairs first, seeing as the mercs got through those quickest of all.

"Right, you two," Engy dumped the pair of offense classes on the floor, "Y'all are gonna CALMY and CAREFULLY test chairs."

Now, to the majority of rational people, testing chairs meant 'place rear end on them'. Not to these REDs. They were testing _durability._

What Engy was asking for was for them to check maybe the legs of the chairs, give 'em a wee kick maybe. Maybe just lean back further than would be considered normal. Maybe.

So when he looked back he wasn't expecting the sight that seared his eyes.

"WHAT IN THE NAME OF ALL THINGS EXPLOSIVE AND AWESOME ARE YOU DOIN'?"

Somehow, Scout and Pyro had set up no less than four hundred chairs in the shape of a racetrack. And they were flying around it. Literally.

Confused beyond belief, Engy consulted Teddy Roosebelt, who watched on from his ammo belt. A few seconds of discussion later, the RED grabbed the Pyrovision Goggles from his inventory and put them on.

He immediately regretted it.

Pyro was riding Balloonicorn and Scout Reindoonicorn around the track, little Balloondoonicorn scampering behind them. They flew low as well, so the chairs they bashed into were thoroughly tested.

Rainbows burst from everything involved and all was truly wonderful.

Until the manager showed up.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Soldier, Sniper and Demo had just reached the appliance shop, when someone oddly familiar approached them.

"HEY YOU." He said, pointing at Sniper. This, children, was very rude of him. He shouldn't have done that. Dick.

"Yeahhhh?" Sniper garbled drunkenly, regardless. He turned to face the guy he was addressing. It's only polite to do that, see. The guy was tall. Really damn tall, and built like Heavy 2.0.

He quickly got right in Sniper's face.

"Remember me?" he asked darkly.

"Nope!" Sniper replied cheerfully. "Are you flexing…?"

"NO, I am NOT." The guy insisted, flexing. "But I remember _you._ You're the bloke who gave me lemonade. WHICH WASN'T LEMONADE."

Oh, I knew those Dare Games would come back to haunt them.

"And then you threw that kid at my face."

"We never did find out how Scout survived that," Demo mused. The three mercs stared at the sky for a moment, wondering. The guy had to cough for attention. Having already forgotten he was there, Sniper looked at him again.

"'ello. Can I help ya?"

In answer, the man went ahead and attempted to punch poor Snipey. But the marksman was a _mercenary. _A battle-hardened, cold-blooded mercenary.

So he and Demo dodged by running away screaming.

Soldier facepalmed. Now he'd have to take care of this himself. But the patriot was a _mercenary. _A rocket-enthusiastic, crazed-gunman of a mercenary.

So he gave the guy a roundhouse kick. In the lower regions.

Sniper and Demoman abruptly reappeared, high fived (several times, because the drunk men kept missing) and the trio of REDs finally made their way into the shop.

~CITY (ONE)~

"OH GOTT. OH GOTT."

"ARGHHHH!"

"… This is oddly amusing."

Medic and Heavy continued to yell in horror as the suddenly-freed Spy chuckled on the sidelines. Heavy was trapped in the automatic door, which had somehow closed over his head so he was suspended upside down. The defence class flailed. It wasn't very effective.

"MEDIC! MEDIC! DOCTOR!" Heavy shrieked in an oddly feminine voice, "WHAT DO I DO?"

"I HAVE NO IDEA!" Medic threw both arms up, "UM. DON'T MOVE." He took several paces back, ignoring the snickering Spy. "Vhat I'm going to do is punch you, ja?"

"Okay. Wait. WHAT?"

Medic raised a fist in preparation, a morbid smile dominating his expression. Surely, this plan had no flaws, he thought, starting his sprint. After all, how hard could it be to punch a man free of a door?

Spy was in hysterics mere moments later.

Medic had triggered the censor on the door when he charged, opening it, but he was going too fast to stop. Heavy flopped to the ground, Medic tripped over his head and flew into the shop with all the grace of a dead robot on wheels. Seconds after, the door closed once again on Heavy's skull.

Spy took a moment (and some pictures with his camera beard) to regain his composure, then sauntered up to the door.

"Gentlemen," he called smugly, bringing out his sapper. "Allow me."

In the next eight seconds the RED would learn the hard way not to sap automatic doors.

~SMALL CITY (THREE), PYROLAND~

Whoo. That man sure sounded angry. Pyro wondered what the matter was, because he was shouting rather loudly.

Distracted, the pyromaniac fell off Balloonicorn and tumbled into a stack of chairs, knocking them all over. The merc emerged, miraculously unharmed, from the pastel-coloured pile of wood and walked casually toward the man, who was now screaming at poor Engy.

Pyro smiled though, pulling out the rainblower. It knew how to make eeeeeverything better.

~REALITY~

"AND HOW DID YOU EVEN SET UP THIS MANY CHAIRS SO QUICKLY!?" the manager certainly hadn't let up any, "GET OUT OF THE SHOP OR- OH GOD I'M ON FIRE!"

The Engineer, still a little bothered by all the yelling, confirmed that, yes, the guy was on fire. The merc peeked curiously behind them to see Pyro. The offense class giggled contentedly, waving its flame thrower back and forth.

"Well thanks Pyro," Engy gave it a thumbs up, "But ya best airblast 'im now…"

Pyro obliged, having forgotten that the airblast was set to Overload, which totally exists and was not added for this story. Either way the manager hit the back wall.

"RED TEAM AWAY!" Scout shouted, suddenly swooping in on Reindoonicorn and grabbing both of his teammates. They flew majestically toward the table section, leaving the semi-conscious-but-at-least-not-on-fire manager behind.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

"Right, ladies," Soldier stood straight, arms akimbo, as he surveyed the shop, "One of you tell me what exactly appliances actually are."

"A domestic electrical machine," Sniper said robotically, looking over his specs for dramatic emphasis. Then he belched and walked off.

"…I'm never making him drink again," the Demoman stated, having returned to his usual bearable state of drunkenness. Soldier patted his shoulder in agreement before following the support class to the section marked 'Kitchen Appliances'.

People, innocent civvies, wisely scarpered when they saw the three mercenaries heading their way. They _really _need to start hiding their grenades… There's probably a hat for that.

HA HA. HAT for that, like- yeah, okay.

Well. Sniper whipped a shopping trolley out of nowhere and waited for the others to catch up. The moment they did, he hopped on the back wheels and insisted on being pushed.

"Wheee," he mumbled happily when Soldier complied, the offense class selecting a blender at random and chucking it in the cart.

Cart. Like the payload. Soldier blanched.

It- it was in his nature! He had to stop the cart from reaching the final terminus!

"FOR AMERICAAAA!"

~CITY (ONE)~

"… How did ve get here?" Medic blinked in confusion, finding himself, Heavy and Spy standing in the centre of the giant-shop-that-sells-everything. A quick glance at his teammates made him suspect they had somehow sustained incredibly bad burns. Honestly he wasn't too sure how they were alive.

"Does not matter!" Heavy proclaimed, apparently unaware smoke was rising from his body, "Time for shopping!"

Spy meanwhile had some kind of flashback and shuddered, shying away from a pyramid of cans. Using his best summoning cry of 'Mentlegen!' he led his fellow REDs away from there to _anywhere the heck else_. The whole payment thing occurred to him at that moment, but he figured it would be more fun to not point it out just yet.

Instead, the Frenchman set his mind to deciding which kinds of food the base needed, seeing as Sandviches were pretty much the only things available these days. And Heavy got territorial of them more often than not.

So that left the Spy two options: numéro un; get some nice edible stuff for the purposes of a healthy, balanced diet, or numéro deux; get assorted rubbish, just for the kicks.

"Well," the support class mused aloud, "it has to be the latter."

He flounced off to what could only be described as the processed food aisle, Medic and Heavy trustingly following after. The two-support-one-defence classes also scared everybody off unintentionally, those darn meddling kids. Then again, since the mace-to-the-face, that was probably a good thing.

BUT THEN.

"Hang on a second- I recognise you!"

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**Ooh, I totally forgot; I don't own TF2! Praise Valve :D**

**Another cliffhanger! Muahaha!**

**Anyway, thanks so much for reading! You guys rule! :)**


	4. Playing With Danger

Chapter Four – Playing With Danger

~CITY (THREE)~

There was a short span of time the Reindoonicorn effortlessly carried the three mercs along, gliding just under the roof. Then the laws of physics remembered to apply and they crash-landed in the table section of the department store.

"Right." Engy got to his feet like nothing had happened, hoping the remainder of his sanity would hold up. "We're gonna need _one _table for the rec room." He turned to address Pyro and Scout, making absolute certain they understood the 'one' thing.

Of course, they were gone.

"Why do Ah even bother…" The Engineer trudged dutifully after them, wondering if he would've been better off coming alone.

For the record, he would have. Cue gunshot.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

One large, recalibrating bonk to the head later, Sniper was feeling significantly less drunk and a lot more in pain. Not to mention the lack of recollection of where he was. Mildly unsettling.

He was comforted by the usual sight of Soldier screaming at something and banging a shovel against his helmet. It was hauntingly familiar to _every other time_ he saw said teammate.

"Um, Soldier?" Sniper sat up, having found out he was lying on a linoleum floor somewhere, "Where are we, mate?"

Soldier glanced at the marksman from where he was punching an upended shopping trolley. He sheepishly lowered both fists before replying;

"Well… do you remember that place we went to? About the space of fifty one chapters ago, if ya count the oneshots."

"'Course."

"We're there."

"I see."

The pair of them awkwardly stared at each other, silence lengthening between them. Then the Demoman flickered across their respective fields of vision, juggling microwaves. Oh good; things make sense again. Carry on lads.

~CITY (ONE)~

As I'm sure/fairly certain you all know, part of a Spy's job involves _not _being recognised. Hence, someone recognising our pally Spy here- that's kinda a buzzkill. The Frenchman pivoted in slow motion to see just who _dared _to know who he was.

_The owner of the shop._

Heavy and Medic exchanged a puzzled glance in the background as the Spy looked on blankly in disguised horror. The manager and merc stared each other down for several minutes, until the former slowly said;

"Yeah… It's definitely you- the guy who I hired for some reason! You're the one who got maced while wearing the fish costume."

Trying to ignore the insensitive schadenfreude of his colleagues, the Spy straightened his tie. Time to be a smart-ass and get his way out of this one.

~CITY (THREE)~

Engy learned something wonderful that day.

He found that, if he didn't look, didn't open his eyes, then as far as he was concerned everything was _alright._ Great feeling, knowing everything's alright.

He did, however, discover a flaw in this.

He could still hear the gunfire.

"S'fine, Engy," he consoled himself, still not looking, "Nothing's happenin' out there. NOTHIN'." A massive explosion literally shook the department store. "_Nothin' nothin' nothin'…_" Reluctantly, the Engineer cracked one eye open. "Aw… gosh darn it to heck…"

Pyro, evidently, had made a large-scale Jenga tower out of tables, and it used a combination of airblasts and shotgun shells to play. At the other end of the table aisle, Scout had blown up the staff coffee machine and was running circles around it, firing off his scattergun for some unspecified purpose.

Both offense classes were positively riddled with splinters, too.

Well then. That posed a practical problem. The Engineer deliberately drew his wrench from his tool belt, Teddy Roosebelt snuggling into the ammo pouch for safety.

Engy fixed_ practical problems._

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Now moderately-sober as a unit, the Demoman, Soldier and Sniper continued shopping. They started with the obvious- toasters! It's not like they had hundreds back at the base or anything. Soldier felt himself pout. The point was, they had to outshop the others so his bro Scout wouldn't ditch him again.

With that in mind, the mercs realised they needed an expert's opinion, so they could purchase the very best toaster.

Wait, purchase?

"We, eh, don' have money." Demo observed at last, scratching the back of his head. Soldier nodded, the same thing having dawned on him. The pair of them proceeded to shrug aloofly and begin searching for a member of staff.

Meanwhile, Sniper returned from his jarate break just in time to accidently slam the bathroom door in the face of guy-from-Dare-Games-who-was-out-to-get-him, knocking the man unconscious. The RED paused, nudged the guy with his foot, then casually walked away, whistling.

~CITY (ONE)~

"Listen closely," Spy told the manager in his best 'Bro I am serious' voice, "That was all a ruse. The fish costume? Made to toy with your mind. Me? _I don't exist._"

Medic and Heavy blinked.

"You are in the middle of a year-long guilt-induced dream sequence," Spy went on in earnest, "It is time. Life or death. And- OH MY GOODNESS A UNICORN YOU HAD BETTER DUCK."

With nary a heartbeat of hesitation the shop manager shrieked at an ear-splittingly high pitch and launched himself under the nearest shelf. Spy swiftly grabbed a banana from said shelf and wielded it like a revolver.

"We must battle the unicorn!" He cried, not realising how much he had gotten into character. Mocking the Demoman's accent he yelled, "FREEDOM!" and pretended to shoot at the 'unicorn'. Visibly excited by his lie now, he nodded very enthusiastically to his teammates with a pleading expression, trying to convey the vibes of 'MAKE HIM BELIEVE IT'.

Happy enough to go along with most things, Heavy hopped on board immediately. The Russian roared a battle-cry and lobbed a watermelon in the direction of the imaginary unicorn.

Medic sighed in submission. He was pretty much already involved anyway.

"Los weiter!"

~CITY (THREE)~

The Engineer well and truly snapped that day. He epically vaulted a table heading his direction, made a few angry noises, then Sparta-kicked the 'Jenga tower'. A cool guy, he didn't even bother to look as the tables fell neatly into their rows.

Next, Engy cartwheeled across the room, whacked the coffee machine with his wrench, and it was magically fixed, no trouble. The merc then tore his glove off, revealing the gunslinger, and grabbed both the Scout and Pyro in one fell swoop.

Grinning manically, he plonked them down and glared into their very souls.

"You two." Nervously, the terrified offense classes pointed at themselves. "Yes. _You. _What yer gonna do is go CHOOSE A FREAKIN' TABLE."

Mumbling something like '_someone's _OOC' Scout sprinted for the tables in panic. Pyro gave a very hesitant thumbs up, backing away slowly in the same direction.

And just like that Engy blinked and reverted to his normal, amiable self. He and Teddy Roosebelt sauntered away happily to get some coffee.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Sniper reunited with his teammates to find them cornering a poor wee member of staff against the back wall of the shop. The merc approached with caution;

"Um, what're ya doin'?" he asked, debating internally whether he really wanted to know. Soldier and Demo turned around, revealing the different toasters they were holding. And shoving in the random shop assistant girl's face.

"WELL," Soldier began, brandishing his toaster, "We only want the toaster that is the very best! Like no one ever was!" He tossed the appliance to the staff member so he could gesticulate more. Ignoring the fact the girl fell down, sporting a toaster-shaped wound, the Demoman continued;

"So we were askin' this lass. But now she's prob'ly dead. Shame."

They solemnly doffed their hats, completely missing how the girl got up and ran away. With reckless abandon they selected a toaster at random and carried on their merry way.

~CITY (ONE)~

After a good few minutes ideally having a foodfight with thin air, the Heavy, Medic and Spy took off, yelling nonsensical things about unicorns. Once they were a safe range away from the still-cowering manager, they slowed to a trudge and dusted themselves down a little.

"Let us shop, gentlemen," Spy said, with such nonchalance it was easily to believe that _hadn't _just happened.

But it had. _And it's burned in your memory forever._

For some reason there was a basket on Heavy's head, so they used that. To Spy's disappointment the manager's intervention had denied them access to the processed food aisle, so they would have to get normal stuff. Well, normal for _them_.

I mean the REDs. Not 'them' like the Spy and manager, which just sounds like a bad sitcom.

Quick, somebody make that show while Medic suddenly gets attacked by a pigeon.

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**Free hats to anyone who knows where the chapter title comes from :p**

**(Also, little reference in there somewhere; you're a God if you pick up on it!)**

**Thank you for reading and reviewing! :D**


	5. It's Called TEAM Fortress

**Whoohoo! People got that reference! My life is complete :D**

**And yup, Playing With Danger is a TF2 song :p**

**If you got that expect a Pyro on a tricycle to deliver your free hats in three to five working days**

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Chapter Five – It's Called TEAM Fortress

~CITY (THREE)~

The REDs decided they had had enough shopping for one day. For one century. For eternity.

Scout and Pyro had indeed picked out a nice table for the rec room – nearly an exact replica of their current one, but still – and the Engineer used his ENGY POWERS to carry it along.

Because the manager was more dead than alive at this point, the only thing stopping them from walking out with the furniture was their conscience. Yes- conscience, singular; only Engy really had one. But an episode of sub-psychotic rage will do things to a person.

Pyro said something.

"The sense a' forebodin' is back?" Engy translated. "Wonder what that is…?" he mumbled thoughtfully, shifting the massive table more comfortably over his shoulder.

"Hey, hey, I'll bet ya Soldier's beatin' someone up, and Medic's, like, fightin' a giant bird or somethin'." Scout did that weird little laugh he tends to do while he bouncy-walked ahead of his teammates.

… Does no one else bouncy-walk? Is that just me?

Chuckling all mature-like, the three mercs arrived at the teleporter behind the building. Engy lobbed the table through and they followed it along, soon rematerialising in their base.

Interestingly, after they were through, on either side of them were great big flashes of light. Leaning on their new table, Pyro, Scout and Engy watched as Spy and Sniper appeared from other teleporters. They spotted their teammates and immediately began yelling;

"SOLDIER'S BEATIN' UP ALL THE STAFF AT THE APPLIANCE SHOP."

"MEDIC HAS BEEN KIDNAPPED BY A GIANT PIGEON."

…

"What the _crap_?" Scout deadpanned.

"HALP!" the flustered support classes demanded at the same time, pointing very over-dramatically at the teleporters to Sections Seven and One. Balloonicorn and Reindoonicorn herded little Balloondoonicorn from the room, finding it was difficult to keep the baby from seeing too much violence while they lived with nine insane mercenaries.

Engy meanwhile worked stuff out.

"Scout, Pyro, go with Sniper, attack Soldier if ya have to. Ah'll go with Spah and find out what in the heck yer sayin' 'bout pigeons."

"BREAK!" The team all slapped an immense high five in the middle of the room, then leaped semi-gracefully into the teleporters.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Sniper, Scout and Pyro hurried through the seaside town, like one of those epic chase scenes in movies minus the epic. In other words they tripped over everything.

Nevertheless Sniper led them to the appliance store alive and in one piece. They tackled the door down – literally, it actually snapped off at the hinges – and hustled toward the commotion further inside. The mercs paused, seeing their Demoman slumped in a corner, but figured that could wait for now.

It wasn't hard to find Soldier.

"There is good news!" the man was bellowing, "You ladies give me an excuse to say 'maggot' more, you maggots!" His teammates hurried up to him as he punched the rest of the staff members in the face.

How unfortunate for them their uniform was blue.

"MAGGOTS."

Scout and Sniper blinked. We can assume Pyro did too.

"D'ya think we should stop him?" Scout enquired, like he wasn't fussed either way. Sniper considered for an unreasonable amount of time, then went with 'Yeah'.

Just like that the mercs snapped to action, the magically revived Demoman alongside.

"IT'S OOOONNNN!"

~CITY (ONE)~

Engy and Spy blundered into the walls of the RED respawn, having forgotten jumping through teleporters was a less-than-spectacular idea. Soundlessly agreeing not to mention that, the mercs hastened toward the supermarket.

After weaving through several side streets in what was supposedly a shortcut, they made it. To the entrance. Where the automatic door was.

Spy immediately began plotting, trying to figure out how they would get inside the building. Come to think of it, he had no idea how he had gotten out in the first place. Had he died or something…?

Distracted, the support class didn't notice how Engy simply strolled on through the door like it proved no challenge to his mighty wrath. Startled, Spy merely nipped in after him and pretended he wasn't in awe.

Meanwhile, as those two were taking their sweet old time, Heavy was busy attempting to work out what the Hell just happened. Of all the things he'd ever seen, experienced, heard about, this was by far the most peculiar.

The Russian proceeded to make a list of pros and cons, because that's the standard thing to do in any crisis. Con; a giant pigeon had just carried off Doctor. Pro; Medic was currently punching said pigeon, which meant he was very much alive and even more pissed off. Con; Medic was pissed off. Heavy knew bad things happened under that circumstance.

He was working on finding another pro.

"What." Usually, Engy went for longer phrases signifying 'WHAT THE HELL?' but only 'What' really seemed appropriate for the situation. Heavy turned to see him and the Spy arrive.

"… I don't know." He said flatly, well and truly confused.

They looked up in horrified curiosity to see Medic attempting to strangle to giant pigeon to no effect.

"ZHIS IS REEEEEALLY WEIRD!" the doctor proclaimed as the bird passed overhead. If the other REDs were about to reply they were interrupted by heavy footsteps on either side of them.

"Long time no see, _RED Team."_

OMG BLUS.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Under the assumption he wasn't paying attention to them, the four mercs were unpleasantly surprised when Soldier reacted quite expertly to their attack.

So expertly, in fact, that Sniper, Demo and Scout accidently smashed right into the civvies, and Pyro zipped straight out the window. Soldier watched his fellow offense class sail into the street with an air of puzzlement.

"When'd you get here? How did- GASP." And he actually said gasp, because Scout had the nerve to come here. "FREAKIN' YOU."

Unfortunately Scout couldn't see my previous narrative, so he didn't know why his teammate was so pissed at him. He did know that at the moment he, some civvies and a couple of teammates were in some kind of awkward Twister pose, and the socially acceptable thing to do would be to get out of it.

The Demoman extracted himself first and glared condescendingly at Soldier;

"Y'cannae attack civvies just 'cause they're wearin' blue! HAVE YE NO SHAME!?"

Soldier blinked, "No."

"Oh, aye, well then. We'll leave ye to it." Demo sauntered off to find some booze. While that was happening, Sniper was subtly telling the clueless civilians to _get the Hell outta there _by double-armed pointing at the door from behind Soldier's back.

He did this, of course, without realising he was actually standing in front of Soldier. He'd lost his glasses in the failed-attack.

Still running on instincts, Soldier shoved him out the way and moved to finish off the 'BLUs', only to be smashed upside the head by a toaster. Pyro wondered why Solly fell over at that, because as far as it knew that toaster was a fluffy pillow.

Nevertheless, the team figured shopping was done for the day and dragged everybody in the direction of the teleporter.

…

"Should we have called the police?" a civvie asked quietly in the following silence.

~CITY (ONE)~

Heavy, Spy and Engy all pivoted, intending to dramatically turn and face the BLU team.

Naturally they all spun the wrong way, ended up staring at each other in a cramped triangle shape and got uncomfortable. The BLUs waited politely as they sorted themselves out, absently watching the RED Medic and pigeon circle overhead in a death grip.

"You good?" a BLU Demoman checked after a good couple of minutes.

"Yeah, yeah we got it sorted," Engy replied, "Thanks."

"Oh, no problem, no problem!" BLU Spy said. "NOW WE KILL YOU."

The three REDs appeared genuinely surprised by this plot twist. Shocked, they waited for the classic 'enemy divulges all their plans' moment.

"See, we made a _plan_," BLU Soldier stated, right on queue. "Simple, but EFFECTIVE. Build a huge bird robot to take your Medic outta commission!"

"…_Simple?_" RED Spy repeated dubiously.

"Yeah, and, cuz we hadn't shown up in yer stories for ages, we were hopin' you'd underestimate us, so we could kill ya and take the base back," BLU Scout finished.

"Is good plan," RED Heavy mused approvingly. He noted how they were cornered in the aisle and how that was a nice little touch in the scheme. Similarly he realised the REDs didn't have weapons on them, because who needs them for _shopping_? Seriously.

Unless of course it's weapon shopping.

That's not the point. FIGHT!

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***Alarm sounds* Intruder alert! Big exams coming up!**

**Won't see you guys for a wee while, but thanks so much for the reviews! :D**


	6. Guns and Haircuts

**Hey guys! Make sure you read chapter five first please! For some reason alerts and things didn't go out :(**

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Chapter Six – Guns and Haircuts

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Eventually, the five mercs in the seaside town wearily arrived at the building the teleporter was on. Demo and Pyro lugged the unconscious Soldier onto the roof with little bother and soon they all staggered through the machine in a flash of light.

Unfortunately a bunch of loose ceiling tiles came with them and the mercs had to spend a while digging themselves out. Soldier woke up just in time to shoot bolt upright in panic and thump his head on the new table.

"Ow, what the Hell…?" He glanced around (with minor difficulty due to concussion/oversized helmet issues) and saw half the team sitting tensely beside him. "…Men." He acknowledged.

…

"This is awkward." Scout stated, quite truthfully.

On some, silent level, everybody probably agreed, but they merely sat there amidst the wreckage, fidgeting. Oddly, Sniper was the one to break the silence.

"So… I hear Medic got attacked by a bird."

The Demoman sprung to action;

"Then why in the Hell are w' still here!?"

That being a rather good question, the five REDs all but dove into the teleporter.

Teleporter Six, that is.

~MEANWHILE, CITY ONE~

Shall we summarise? I do enjoy a good summarising.

Current events of the day include: The team going shopping, the team failing at shopping, the team fighting an imaginary unicorn, the Medic being attacked and carried off by a robotic pigeon, and right around now, the BLUs happen to be ambushing the REDs. After divulging their plan, of course.

Over time, the mercs had come to forget what the Hell feelings were. Only natural, see, in this kind of war-themed hat simulator. Now, though, they seemed to be having feels of some description.

"_It can't be._" Heavy breathed, making the rookie-mistake-that-everyone-in-a-video-game-makes of standing still in a battle scene. "I FEAR NO MAN." He insisted to himself.

But here he was. _Fearing. Some. Men._

PLOT TWIST.

"I suggest we run," Spy commented, like he wasn't really fussed. Somehow the BLUs hadn't reached them yet, because story logic. Anyway as nice an idea as that was, Engy had a point to make;

"What about the doc?" He gestured loosely to the roof, ignoring the advancing enemy even though that weird old 'fear' thing was back. Medic was in the process of being throttled by the giant bird, despite the merc's valiant attempts at clubbing it to death with the solemn vow.

Because they knew they were protected by Plot Armour (look it up) the RED mercs sat down to make a nice little plan and-

_BAM._

OH. OH GOD. THAT'S A LOT OF BLOOD.

~MOUNTAIN (SECTION SIX)~

The first thing the five mercs noticed was that they had taken the wrong teleporter.

They knew this because _they were on top of a freakin' mountain._

"…When we get back," Soldier said, "we're asking Engy why THE HELL he put one of these up here." The team made a circle of handshakes in agreement, then stood up to head on back through the teleporter.

Which wasn't there. Insert obscenities of your choice here.

While everyone else panicked and realised how cold they were, Pyro came up with an obvious answer to where the machine was. It was about to tell the guys to start digging in the snow when Soldier, running in circles with Scout and Sniper, somehow managed to hit both it and Demo with his shovel.

Both of them promptly fell over the cliff and started their painful descent into respawn.

"Aw, Goddammit…" Soldier sighed, watching them fall. "They're not gonna take this too well."

Due to the offense class accidently wiping out the only one with a good idea, the REDs narrowed their next move down to two options. Sniper offered the first;

"If w' climb down this side, we'll hit the town again. Use the teleporter there."

"Or go back," Scout added, "and find the one in the woods."

Soldier only remembered that the runner was here at that point, and recalled how he was mad at him. However, what with all the head injuries, he wasn't quite sure _why _he was mad.

"There is a third choice!" He announced suddenly, producing a full-sized survival kit from his undersized pocket. Before Scout had time to be confused at that, Soldier had pulled out a length of rope and forced him to hold it. "Just yell screamin' eagles and you'll be fine."

"W-what? OH GOD MAN DON'T!"

Too late. Scout was thrown off the cliff.

Sniper found himself wondering if any of this would be happening had he had gone shopping with Engy instead of Pyro and Scout.

~CITY (ONE) BATTLE OF THE SUPERMARKET~

Incidentally, we learned something that day.

We learned that being pummelled from all sides by some severely pissed off BLUs is not a pleasant experience. By all means, try to avoid it.

But don't join BLU to avoid it. I swear bro them REDs will get ya.

Still in his aerial struggle with the pigeon, Medic watched on as Spy, Engy and Heavy were battered like fish or something. Similes aren't my strong point.

"Comrades," Medic called down, mildly concerned. "Need some help zhere?"

"WOULD BE APPRECIATED!" Engy replied, ever polite.

Medic complied, pausing in hitting the bird with his solemn vow and holding the Hippocrates bust at eye level. Looking through it like a periscope, he could see the HP metres of their enemies.

"Okay, see the Spy zhat's punching your face, Heavy?"

"DA!"

"Vell, he's only on five. You could probably kill him by sneezing. And Engineer, zhere's a Soldier behind you on twenty. PUNCH HIM VITH ZHE GUNSLINGER!" Medic laughed manically until the pigeon started clawing at him again.

The RED Heavy and Engy followed his advice and suddenly realised _they could do this._ They were the main characters. Surely, the laws of favouritism would permit them to win this fight! THEY TOTALLY HAD THIS!

"Hey guys," a BLU Scout interrupted their sense of euphoria, "Why ain't we usin' guns?"

…

"…Oh, dis is bad…" RED Heavy mumbled, the BLUs suddenly whipping out a variety of weird and wonderful weapons.

"I am not the slightest bit honoured to having served with you," Spy said, quite rudely but truthfully.

Heavy and Engy shrugged in the heartbeat before their rather untimely deaths.

Also the pigeon finally killed Medic.

~RED RESPAWN~

The Demoman and Pyro blinked awake in the respawn room with very contrasted emotions.

Pyro, on the one hand, was jolly as usual and couldn't even recall how they had died. Demo, on the other, was pissed beyond belief because not only had Soldier killed him, but he had made him _sober_.

That sucked.

Demo did know, however, that Soldier and co would be heading to the shop in this very city. I'm suddenly wondering if there is a plothole here. Either way he _did _know, and that meant he had to go to said shop for his revenge. Even better, his buddy Pyro was here to help!

"'ere, Pyro," the Scotsman hollered, "Ye any good a _revenge_?"

'_Do you like playing games?_' Pyro heard, so it nodded eagerly. Demo grinned;

"Great! Cuz we're gonna-"

WOAH. Woah. You don't need to hear that. Just have the Pyrovision version.

'_We're going to hug our dear friend Solly until he can't stop laughing and rainbows stain the walls and he's begging for cake but we give him lollypops and joy then you get the rainblower and crank up the awesome until he falls asleep._'

That sounded splendid! Pyro was on board.

~SECTION SIX-POINT-FIVE~

Soaring halfway between the mountain and the seaside town, the Scout had some time to do something he often didn't- think.

Now, he had a couple of things to ponder. Firstly, Soldier probably had _some _reason for being angry. History suggested he didn't, but this time he probably did. It clicked for the runner all of sudden; the Soldier had left the hall so discreetly in chapter one- but clearly that's where the issue was.

Well, that mystery was solved. Now for a more pressing one.

WHAT THE HELL WAS HE SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THIS ROPE!?

Scout barely remembered to double jump when he eventually hit ground level, so he didn't y'know, die. He found himself in town seven, on the side of a road. Okay, so he was alone and clueless, but at least he had the rope.

"Oh hey there's a label on it… 'Abseil Emergency Rope'. Huh."

Sounded like a plan. Scout headed toward the nearest tall building.

* * *

**I have no idea.**

**Thanks for reading! :D**


	7. Giant Birds and Abseiling

**This thing was gonna be, like, three chapters**

**WHAT'S HAPPENING. WHAT IF IT NEVER ENDS**

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Chapter Seven – Giant Birds and Abseiling

~CITY ONE, THE STREETS SOMEWHERE~

The Demoman and Pyro had discovered a minute problem in their seemingly-flawless plan.

Frankly they had no idea where the supermarket was. What they _did _have in mind was Spy's account of his part time job there- the Frenchman had mentioned (practically crying in horror) that the logo was a fish wearing a top hat and riding a bicycle.

Surely, such a thing wouldn't be too hard to spot.

They thought they had it at one point, but that fish was clearly wearing a bowler hat. Also there was a giant bird-shaped hole in the roof. Shrugging, the mercs walked on past, whistling all the while.

~RED RESPAWN~

Medic, Heavy and the Engineer stumbled out of respawn, near falling straight over on the pavement. Their BASE was at stake now! PROBLEM! CAPS LOCK!

"We gotta find the others," Engy set down quickly, "an' then- _where the heck is Spah?_"

Sure enough, no Spah to be found.

"EVERYTHING HAS GONE WRONG!" Heavy cried, facepalming so hard he did a backflip. The pair of defence classes turned to Medic for _support _(HON HON HON WHAT A PUN) only to find him staring blankly in the approximate direction of the shop.

"Doctor…?" Heavy waved in his face for attention.

"… I vas killed by a bird." Medic stated, like the fact was physically painful. "So zhat's how it is."

Probably under the assumption the BLUs would take a short while to get to and take over the base, Medic executed the most daring, ambitious, _damn stupid_ plan known to Mann.

~THE MOUNTAIN (SIX)~

"Sure is boring up here," Soldier grumbled, doing push ups for no reason. Staring into space, Sniper replied with a simple 'Hm'. They both jumped when the emergency rope – which they had secured to a trusty-looking rock – pulled taught. "Ooh, great!" Soldier vaulted to his feet. "You ready?"

Sniper blinked slowly.

"… Fer what?"

Instead of giving a substantial response, Soldier said,

"Sniper, do you trust me?"

"Not really, no."

"TOO BAD SON." Soldier grabbed Sniper then simply leaped at the rope. "ABSEIL FUN!"

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

Scout, perched on the chimney of a house in the seaside town, sincerely hoped he'd tied the rope right. Worst case scenario, he reckoned, was Soldier and Sniper died then made the rest of his life a living Hell.

That wouldn't be all too bad, in the grand scale of things.

So, forgetting his safety concerns, Scout broke the forth wall and checked out the Robotic Boogaloo Update on a laptop because it was so awesome.

After laughing at the great comic for ten straight minutes (becausetheauthordid) he heard a weird whooshing noise and stood up to find out what the Hell was making it.

Cue forty-mile-an-hour-Soldier-and-Sniper abseiling impact.

~SHOP (CITY ONE)~

Spy _loved _Dead Ringers.

They were totally his favourite thing of the day at least.

Of course, now that he had escaped the BLU onslaught, he needed a way to stop them from getting the base. Like any good Spy, he had his knife on him, so that was something. In theory, he could simply backstab and stealthy stealth his way through the shop, killing them all, until things were awesome again.

There was just _one _little issue. Dat robot pigeon.

_It knew things. Everything._

And, after figuring out sappers did zilch to the thing, Spy decided he hated any and all chase scenes involving birds.

~RED BASE~

Medic had never stormed quite so dramatically into a building before. But it was certainly empowering when he did.

The doctor strode purposefully into the base, lab coat all billowy and epic. At the top of his lungs he screeched;

"WHERE IS HERR BALLOONICORN!?" His glasses magically morphed into Pyrovision goggles so he could see the pink balloon animal career toward him. "I NEED YOUR HELP."

And thus, the plan was underway.

Heavy and Engy wondered what the frick was going on.

~TOWN (SEVEN)~

_COMPOUND ELEVATED SKULL FRACTURE!_

That seems an appropriately shocking way to start this section. Also, it's a reference. So that's fun.

ANYWAY, that's the injury Scout sustained. Soldier and Sniper got up quite indifferently and helped/shoved the kid down from the roof.

"Why was _that _the go-to plan?" Scout pouted severely. Soldier thought for a moment.

"Dunno. But here we are! NO DWELLING ON MY WATCH! NOT IN MY AMERICA."

There was no arguing with that, so Sniper just went ahead and led them to the teleporter, conscious that his teammates were very likely dead or dying.

"We'd better get to the shop, mates," he told them, clambering to the teleporter, "Find out what's happenin'."

With that in mind, when the three mercs arrived in the base garage they slid under the ill-placed table and hurried straight for RV.

"_What's up everybody_?" she asked through the radio, revving the engine. Taking the wheel and reversing toward Teleporter One, Sniper sighed wearily.

"No idea. I just- no idea anymore."

~CITY (ONE) EVEN MORE LOST~

"Pyro, didn't w'pass here earlier?" Demo checked, glancing dubiously at the tall structures all around them. He blissfully ignored the wanted posters depicting him.

"Mmm…" Pyro mumbled thoughtfully. These pastel-coloured block towers _did _look a little too familiar. In fact it was fairly certain that was their respawn over there.

Subconsciously they headed toward the resupply, only to see a great flash of light right beside it.

~MEANWHILE, IN THE SHOP~

"Worst. Day. _Ever_," Spy concluded, still sprinting through the supermarket as though being chased by a giant bird. Oh wait. He was.

Said robot was gaining on him actually, at quite an alarming rate. Somehow Spy was fending off the occasional beak-stab with his butterfly knife as he ran, but it was only a matter of time. He tried to access his 'Ninja Skills' I often chuck into these spinoffs, yet they eluded him because I think it's funnier this way.

The inevitable came at last, and of all places Spy could get cornered it _would _be the processed food aisle. The store manager, just FYI, was still there, mumbling about unicorns. Spy ignored him and backed up against the far shelf, trying to find a way to avoid this rather weird fate.

Judging by the massive bird going for him, options were admittedly limited, BUT THEN;

"ARCHIMEDES- ATTACK!"

Spy's head snapped up to the source of the voice, "What the Hell…?"

Archimedes, the little, cute, slightly evil wee dove had _grown._ A lot. Only Balloonicorn magic could promote that sort of size increase. And Medic was riding him like he'd been doing it all his life.

The pair of them sailed into a death dive and tackled the giant robot pigeon, beginning the most epic and strange battle of the century.

All guns blazing, Engy and Heavy appeared on the ground for support and to hold off the BLUs. Spy had learned that the best solution was to just go with it and joined in, stabbing away with his knife.

Skimming the top shelves, Archimedes and the pigeon remained locked in combat. Medic wielded his crusader's crossbow, taking random shots at their robotic opponent and healing his beloved dove.

That was a sane sentence.

Either way Heavy had gone and punched over some shelves, forming something of a crude barricade from the BLUs. Engy topped it nicely with a mini sentry which took great joy in pissing everyone else off. Seriously if those things weren't so cute I would hate them.

And because they _are _so gosh darn adorable, Engy would be pretty upset if it got blown up by, say, a crocket. Say, a crocket that BLU Soldier over yonder was about to fire at the little gun.

_SHOCK HORROR._

At that moment, RV – Demo and Pyro clinging to the roof – exploded into the shop and slammed straight into said Soldier, doing a… respectable amount of damage, anyway.

"PARTY CRASH!" RED Soldier and Scout yelled, pausing time briefly for a freeze-frame air punch.

Note: These stories will never make sense. Enjoy.

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**Thanks for reading and reviewing! *Cries emotionally* I LOVE YOU GUYS!**


	8. Back to Topic

Chapter Eight – Back to Topic

~SHOP (CITY ONE)~

To sum up, we're in a very big fight scene right now.

Now, as everybody should know, Soldier does love him some fight scenes. Great fun, lotta gore, it's all there. The thing was… it wasn't a shopping trip.

"We've strayed off topic!" he gasped in horror, throwing both arms up and accidently decapitating a cloaked Spy with his shovel. "Huh."

See, he couldn't abandon a fight. That would be silly. But somehow he needed to shop simu- simul- Soldier frowned. _At the same time_. And for some reason he was adamant he would get it started this chapter, which meant he needed to be quick… Scout was pretty quick.

"MAGGOT!" Soldier yelled over the din of gunfire, explosions, and man whining about Unicorns of Death. Somehow Scout knew he was being addressed and wriggled with some difficultly to look at him from the headlock he was in.

"Yeah?"

"OPERATION SHOPATHON. NOW!"

~SOMEWHERE ELSE IN THE SHOP THIS IS REALLY JUST A DIVIDER~

Pyro and Demo, who had hitched a ride on RV without anybody actually knowing, had decided to camp on the roof and shoot everything that moved. Solid plan, gotta admit. Sticky traps surrounded poor confused RV and Pyro had great fun driving folks back with the flame thrower. Kids, it's that time again!

~PYROLAND~

Pyro always did like magic. Sadly – for despite all the positivity in Pyrovision, it did know what sad was – there never seemed to be quite _enough _magic about. On the plus side, the wee blue kids that sometimes showed up seemed eager to help out.

They were surrounding Pyro at the moment actually, where it and its bro Demo were providing rainbows and party poppers respectively. And _holy Balloonicorn turd_, were those some powerful party poppers. Pyro was pretty sure it witnessed a kid hitting the back wall.

He bounced off, of course, ever unharmed, and leapt right back into the game. Then Pyro laughed a little because it had lost that darn Game again.

Now you have too. Ha ha.

Demo also had a stick that sort of resembled a straight candy cane, and it was chanting _hugs hugs huuuugs _over and over. Wow, that Eyelander sure was a nice guy.

Upon seeing their team's Soldier jog past, Pyro abruptly remembered they were supposed to be playing with him just now. Pausing to blow some bubbles at a nearby blue kiddie, Pyro got Demo's attention and pointed out Solly.

~REALITY. I THINK~

The Demoman was actually a pleasant enough fellow when you got to know him. However he's on a hair trigger and usually pretty drunk, so in the span of blinking after seeing the Soldier so kindly pointed out by Pyro, _he transformed._

Not like RV does. More like Hulk. Well, not even Hulk. More like- OKAY HE GOT REAL MAD THAT'S ALL THERE IS TO IT.

Demo pumped an imaginary shotgun because it looks kinda badass when people in movies do it.

"Time for revenge," he stated, snapping on a single Deus Specs lens, "YEEEEAAAAAH!"

~IN A MORE UPWARD SORT OF DIRECTION~

The robotic pigeon currently had height advantage on Medic and Archimedes – who I'm gonna call Archie for now because that's much easier to type quickly – and was scanning them for weaknesses. Medic realised this and scoffed internally. Like the thing could find a weakness.

"OH GOTT HE FOUND A WEAKNESS!" Medic was screaming moments later. Archie had taken a hit.

_And they were falling_.

~BACK-DOWN-THERE-WARD DIRECTION~

As much as Spy was glad the team had come to his aid, he was also fairly annoyed they forgot his weapons. Backstabbing becomes a tricky affair when one is missing their cloaking watch and everybody knows where one is. All he had was the little knife.

Spy briefly let his mind wander to the possibility of _All He Had Was a Knife _hitting theatres near you sometime this summer. Not great, but he could make it work.

Anyway. The point here is that Spy needed a firearm.

Borrowing Sasha was obviously out of the question, so Spy stayed clear of Heavy. Sniper and Engy were the only other teammates nearby. Sniper used piss as a weapon, Spy reasoned, making that not an optimum choice.

Hm, the Engineer then. He remained a little possessive of his wrenches, Scout had taken his pistol, and he was using his shotgun, which really left his buildings.

If Misadventures of the RED Team 2 was anything to go by, using a mini sentry as a hat would be a splendid idea.

~AT THE FRONT OF THE SHOP~

Operation: Shopathon had been in development for a much longer time than Soldier would care to admit. It was one of those 'just in case' plans, and well, here was the case.

"ARE YOU READY PRIVATE!?" Soldier demanded, braced to begin the operation.

"HELL YEAH!"

_Simultaneous shop 'n fight time_.

"WHOO!" both offense classes yelled, leaping into the shopping trolley. Soldier's rocket launcher gave them one Helluva boost from the get-go as they sped down the aisles like a train fuelled with Bonk.

"This plan can't possibly fail!" Soldier proclaimed, making a hard left by leaning out precariously. Good. They had found the bakery section. "Lock and load!"

On passing, Scout grabbed a baguette and wielded it like a bat. Hey, if a fish counts as a bat, freakin' bread gets to be a bat. Come at me bro.

"BONK!" Scout thwacked a couple of BLUs upside the head on passing. "VEGGIES AHEAD !"

Scout battered a few more foes while Soldier sorted through the veggies for the best ones at record pace and chucked them into the cart. He kept a determined lookout for tomatoes, wanting to settle once and for all if they were a fruit or what.

That's the reason he abruptly stabbed his shovel into the floor to act as an emergency brake at the end of the aisle. The tomatoes were on the end. And the next aisle over was the fruit section.

"OH COME ON!"

~RIGHT BEHIND THEM~

"We've got 'im now, Py!" Demo whispered loudly.

"Hudda!"

As far as Pyro was concerned, those were water balloons that its buddy Demo had there. Pyro didn't care for water, but wasn't one to complain. As long as it was FUN-FUN-FUN!

Yeah no those things were sticky bombs.

"Attack on five, a'right?" Demo got ready to throw the explosives of revenge at Soldier. "One… two… Uh. What in the Hell's after two?"

Pyro wasn't sure. So it went ahead and lobbed the first water balloon.

~SIGNIFICANTLY LOWER THAN A GIANT BIRD OUGHT TO BE~

Those moments, right, in books or movies, yeah? When the animal companion, be it a wee bunny or a badass dragon, dies when you least expect it? And it's real sad and you're a sobbing mess for like weeks after? Yeah.

Medic's not gonna let it be one of those times.

"NOT TODAY, ARCHIMEDES!" the doctor cried all dramatic-like, "YOU SHAN'T DIE TODAY!"

He whipped out the medigun.

And triggered the Über.

~GROUND LEVEL~

The Engineer's Engy Senses were tingling.

This was odd, because his sentry wasn't being sapped. He'd know if it was. And there hadn't been enough room to make a dispenser, so it couldn't be anything like that… Investigation needed.

"Heavy, cover mah back a second," he requested, receiving the usual 'Da' in response. Engy casually cleared the way of BLUs with his shotgun, moseying through the carnage at a leisurely pace.

A quick climb proved his initial suspicions; the little sentry was gone.

The defence class was about to go for a slow motion knee collapse with elongated 'No' when he saw Sniper waving from a large pile of baskets serving as a sniping tower.

"Bloody Spy's up t' somethin'!" he called, pointing out the direction Spy presumably went. Engy swiftly donned a cowboy hat so he could tip it in his 'Much obliged' way, then trotted away.

He most certainly did not expect the sight that met his eyes a heartbeat later.

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**Thanks for reading and reviewing guys! Look at all the cliffhangers you get to think about! :D**

***flees***


	9. The Definition of Insanity

**Would that be a Portal reference, 3-D Jak? :p**

**(And oh my god Falsie I have a nickname this is the best day of my life)**

* * *

Chapter Nine – The Definition of Insanity

A lot of things – a lot of weird, some-wonderful-some-less-so things – happened simultaneously in the supermarket.

~ IN THE AMBIGUOUS TOMATO SECTION~

The Demoman, despite all his expertise in everything explosive, had made a rather fatal error.

_Sticky bombs_.

He had chosen to _throw STICKY bombs_.

So, the earlier narrative '[Pyro] went ahead and lobbed the first one' was quite inaccurate. Perhaps a more accurate statement would be 'the Demoman and Pyro accidently full-on launched themselves at the unsuspecting Scout and Soldier staring accusingly at some tomatoes. Holding sticky bombs'.

Yeah, that's about right. Cue explosion.

~ELSEWHERE~

The Engineer had already snapped once today. He didn't really fancy doing it again, cuz he's nice like that, but when he saw Spy…

The Frenchman had found the bike. The fish's bike. He was riding it top speed around the shop, with the manager sitting on the back for some reason and the mini sentry mounted on the front. Somehow the support class had also found time to make a little flag reading 'Mentlegen' too.

He was very proud of it.

Engy? Not so much.

"SPAH WHAT IN THE HECK ARE YA DOIN'!?"

Spy opted to keep pedalling and simply circle his teammate instead of even slowing down. The store manager stared on blankly.

"Being resourceful?" Spy tried, ducking as the mini sentry swivelled to take out a BLU. He noticed Engy cast a confused glance at the manager. "He's the counter weight."

Before the Engineer could even start to think of a retort Heavy came barrelling out of nowhere, yelling something about a big mistake, chain reaction, physics, sandviches and how much gravity was a pain in the ass.

Long story short everything was falling down and the only getaway vehicle was Spy's bicycle.

_Hell yeah_.

~THE PART ALL YOU MEDIC FANS WERE WAITING FOR~

The injured, currently-giant dove had been seconds from impact of the deadly variety with the floor. Then of course, Medic popped the Übercharge.

Know when something was more flammable than ya thought? And suddenly the thing explodes with red light and it's really awesome?

That sounded a little weird, I grant you.

Nevertheless, dear sweet Archie became the perfect robot pigeon counter in the span of a wing beat. REDs and BLUs alike were suddenly enveloped in red light, thinking either Pyro had learned some new fire power or the sun had risen inside the freakin' store as Archie blossomed into pure badass.

"Ja," Medic said smoothly, chilling on the Überbird's back, "Zhat just happened."

With a guitar riff in the background all the fighting suddenly resumed. Shelves cascaded to the floor, crushing mercs and narrowly avoiding Spy's bicycle convoy. For some reason Scout, Soldier, Pyro and Demo flew across the shop. And most importantly Archie shot upward to give dat robot a thorough ass-whoopin'.

Let's sort this out a little.

~ON THE BIKE~

Defying many, many laws of physics and whatnot, the three mercs (and manager) rode furiously for safety on the tiny bike. Heavy provided the base of the pyramid, so he was doing the pedalling. Engy was shortest so he got to sit on the handlebars, cradling the mini sentry. Spy stood on Heavy's head, yelling directions of semi-decent judgment, and the manager remained frozen in shock on the back.

"To the left!" Spy called, indicating with one arm BECAUSE ROAD SAFETY. _The more you know_.

Engy leaned left and the bike skidded around a corner just in time to avoid being squished by two-for-one wholemeal bagels.

Heavy was panting frantically and if Scout was nearby he definitely would've cracked a fatass joke, which Heavy knew. This made Heavy a little bit mad.

"RRRRRAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!" the Russian bellowed coherently, really going for it and achieving a speed boost of ridiculous proportions.

"Hoooly crap…" Engy whimpered, hugging the sentry. Spy meanwhile had the time of his life surfing on a bald guy's head in a supermarket. Isn't that the dream.

Unfortunately, because the support class was too elated to perform his supporting duties, they took a wrong turn. Into the drinks aisle. Where near all the bottles were blue. _So the sentry shot at them._

~THE 'SNIPING TOWER'~

Sniper tended not to regret too many things. It seemed like the perfect way to make yourself feel bad and want lots of cake. And if he wanted cake he damn well wanted to be happy about it.

Point is, today was an exception- he _really _regretted getting drunk and agreeing to go shopping.

Damn. Now he felt like some cake.

Absently headshotting a BLU Heavy before lowering his rifle, the Sniper clambered down the pile of baskets and went to score some cake.

~OTHER END OF THE SHOP~

"Y'know, I don't think I'd be as mad if this was the first time this happened," Soldier commented, noting how he and the other three REDs were getting quite close to a wall now. Demo shrugged – an impressive feat when flying through the air at breakneck speed – and said,

"Well, it's prob'ly not the _last _time it'll happen." As if that helped in any way. In its own little world, Pyro giggled; kids these days.

Their wee awkward moment was interrupted when the four mercs suddenly slammed into the RED Heavy.

~NOW WE'RE BACK ON THE BIKE, SEE~

The last thing that Heavy, Engy, Spy and the manager needed were extra passengers, as the bike had gone wildly out of control as it slipped on all the liquid that the mini sentry had gotten on the floor.

This, fair reader, _sucked_.

And now Demo and Soldier were clinging to either side of Heavy, Scout was practically around Heavy's neck, and Pyro was sort of hugging the store manager, who didn't react in the slightest.

"HEY GUYS!" Scout said cheerfully, not seeming to notice he was on a speeding bike with seven other people. *Collective glare*

The problem now was that, in glaring, Heavy lost further control of the steering. He would soon find out that the 'wet floor' signs were even more dangerous than wet floors themselves.

~UP IN DA SKY~

Übermedes and Medic decided they rather liked kicking ass. Usually neither of them did much fighting, for fairly obvious reasons, but if _this _was what they were missing…?

He was totally going battleMedic.

Archie used his freakin' wing to uppercut the robot pigeon and send it spinning away like some kind of drunken midair ballet.

"_FINISH HIM!_" the announcing voice commanded, this time through the shop's tannoy; complete with irritating beep.

If a giant Übercharged dove could adopt an evil grin, Archie managed it. Unfortunately he didn't manage the dragon-roar he was going for and instead cooed slightly louder than usual.

"Don't vorry, Archimedes, it happens to lots of doves…"

With that Archie surged upward AND RIPPED THE VERY HEAD FROM THE PIGEON! MUAHAHAHA!

Then the second the Über faded Medic was blindsided by a flying bicycle.

* * *

**Thank you for reading! Computing exam coming up so next update might be a wee while, but thanks guys! :D**


	10. Totally Worth It

**We made it!**

* * *

Chapter Ten – Totally Worth It

~SHOP (CITY ONE)~

"Oh, hello Doctor," Heavy greeted politely, having suddenly found the Medic smashed into his face.

"Heavy." Medic addressed curtly. "Vhat's happening, exactly?"

"We're on a bike," Engy answered simply, helping Medic find a seat, "Hit a 'wet floor' sign. Turns out they make great ramps."

"Your bird shrunk," Spy added, "He's on your head."

Medic looked up to confirm that, yes, Archimedes was playing Hat right now and, oh God, there were nine men on this bike. This flying bike. Hm.

"Do ve, perhaps, have a method of landing yet?" the doctor asked, a little uneasily. Everyone froze at the distinct sound of Soldier producing a rocket launcher from nowhere.

"YUP!" the merc announced, "We _don't _land!" And just as the bike was about to smash on the floor he made it rocket jump.

"WHOO!" yelled all three offense classes, immature and oblivious to danger as usual. They flipped off the remaining BLUs below, who threw various things at them and shouted abuse much too severe for a K+ fic.

"I WANNA TRY!" Demo cried suddenly, shooting an excessive amount of stickies under the bike and making them jump again. Everyone flew up off the vehicle for a second, struck poses, then landed semi-neatly back in their pyramid. Except the manager. We may have lost him at some point.

~IN A QUIET CORNER~

RED Sniper sat quite contentedly in a corner on a camping stool, having found his cake. He'd barely settled down when suspenseful music rose from nowhere.

"Aw, piss…" Sniper glanced up, and yep, there was the guy-from-Dare-Games-out-to-get-him. Let's call him GFDGOTGH. "'ello."

"YOU." GFDGOTGH said again, ruder than ever.

"How the Hell'd ya get here?" Sniper asked, trying to work out if that made any sense. GFDGOTGH took a step closer, apparently needing to do so in order to reply.

"I DON'T KNOW, BECAUSE _SOMEONE _KNOCKED ME OUT WITH A DOOR."

"Would ya stop abusin' the caps lock?" Sniper interjected, but he was largely ignored.

"I AM GONNA KILL YOU."

"A little blunt, mate. Can I have my cake first?"

GFDGOTGH incidentally thought 'no' and went ahead and threw a punch. At nothing. Sniper was gone.

~THE BIKE~

Sniper was too used to the misadventurous antics of his team to even question why he was suddenly on the back of a flying bike.

Misadventurous is totally a real word. Bring it.

He did however pause to wonder how all nine of the REDs – not to mention Archimedes, Teddy Roosebelt, and a mini sentry – were comfortably fitting on said bike. Well, comfortably may be a stretch.

They were about to hit the ground again when Pyro, laughing like a… pyromaniac, I suppose, airblasted them back up.

"So…" Sniper glanced around absently, "Where w'goin'?"

Hm. That was a valid concern. In theory, they'd have to land eventually. By this point they had circled the shop twice, Heavy still dutifully pedalling away. Also, 'ex-shop' would be more fitting. Not much of it remained standing.

The automatic door was fine, thank goodness.

Scout Force-A-Natured the bike upward once more, as eight of the mercs waited for someone to reply to Sniper. One extensive, derpy silence later, Demo stepped up;

"Option one- nearest pub. Option two- _let's go the Hell home_."

"Seconded," Engy said immediately, leaning on the right handlebar to turn the bike, which worked because video game logic. Those eleven PhDs of his apparently gave him the ability to find a way to land, which involved using the decapitated pigeon robot as a ramp.

Archimedes and Medic subtly high fived.

On the (rather cluttered) floor once more, the exhausted Heavy slowly turned for the door, cycling for VICTORY. Or something.

But then again…

It wasn't victory, really, if they had technically run from a fight. Guy-from-Dare-Games-out-to-get-Sniper hadn't been taken down. _GFDGOTGS NEEDED TO GO DOWN._

All nine mercs apparently came to this decision – even those who had no idea who GFDGOTGS was, somehow – at the same time. Heavy applied the brakes and the nine mercs nearly shot straight over the front of the bike. Rearranging themselves into a slightly neater formation, though no less awkward, the team and their various companions made a SUPER HIGH QUALITY WELL THOUGHT OUT battle plan.

"Let's go kick his ass," Scout suggested, and that seemed like a solid enough idea, so they went with that.

Soldier, Demo and Heavy, the only ones able to reach the floor, kick started the bike and they cruised through the debris with stern expressions. Pyro kinda killed the effect with its clapping and travelling song, but they looked intimidating otherwise. They also passed the manager at one point, who seemed to be well enough despite being in the foetal position. Ah, details.

"Wait." Spy abruptly captured everyone's attention, "How do we know where he is, exactly?"

"We don't," Sniper responded flatly, "But 'e always appears where I am, so…"

_Ominous footsteps approachinggggg_.

"That'd be him," Soldier bounced giddily on the spot, gladly awaiting another fight. Supposedly the fact they weren't shopping didn't bother him anymore.

"Is time to kill little baby man- _oh my God_," Heavy's tone suddenly changed, "THAT IS NOT BABY MAN."

Oh yeah. Forgot how tough GFDGOTGS was.

"RUN 'IM DOWN HEAVY! RUN 'IM THE HELL DOWN!" Demo cried, because he had the ability to spontaneously get drunk again and freak out. All at once the REDs all began screaming as Heavy rode at the guy.

They only got louder and more frantic as the bike gradually, ever-gradually got closer, when GFDGOTGS casually stopped it with his foot. The mercs promptly fell off their sweet ride.

Sprawled in an undignified heap, the team couldn't do much as the guy stood obnoxiously over them.

"WHERE'S THE AUSSIE BLOKE WHO HIT ME WITH A DOOR?" the dickhead demanded. Sorry, K+; the _rube fellow _demanded. Like a dick.

"Who?" Engy asked innocently, trying to protect his buddy. Spy had the opposite idea;

"Ooh, you mean the Sniper. He's right here, good man!"

"You wanka…"

~AH HA RANDOM DIVIDER~

A span of about two seconds accompany that divider.

In that time frame, two important plot points went ahead and happened while you weren't reading. The first was that GFDGOTGS was unexpectedly flung sideways by an unseen force. Actually Pyro saw it- Balloonicorn felt like a hero.

The second thing was the team up and legged it. In their humiliation runs.

"_Why didn't we just go home_!?" Soldier cried like a real man would. Pyro held Balloonicorn like a lifeline and loudly sobbed agreement as they hustled. Using the helpful 'Exit This Way' signs with the picture of the wee man that looks a bit like the Portal logo, the RED team sprinted directly for the exit, and, being fastest, Scout and Medic were first to get there.

"OH MAN THE DOOR." / "ZHE AUTOMATIC DOOR."

The stared at each other in horror for a few dramatic seconds. Then at the door. Then at their own reflections as Pyro, Engy, Sniper and Spy arrived, tackling them straight into the glass. Instead of thinking rationally and stopping before meeting the same fate, Demo blundered right into the back of them with a rattling crash.

"…So I'm stayin' in respawn forever after w'die." He said slowly. "What's yer plan?"

It was only at that point – when the mercs were wondering which country to flee to – that they remembered how Soldier and Heavy were quite a bit slower than them.

And they'd just left the two of them with GFDGOTGS.

"Not cool guys," the announcer announced through the announcement tannoy in an announcing sort of way. Yup.

Shamefaced, the mercs peeled themselves off the stuck door and shuffled back into personal bubble range. Balloonicorn, Archie and the pocket buddies immediately bailed as the mercs all exchanged the Brofist Of Getting Owned For Da Team.

"ARGHHHHHH!" they screeched, charging blindly in the correct-ish direction. If only they hadn't ignored the foreshadowing of bowling alley music.

"OH DIS IS BAD!" Heavy flew at them like a robot pigeon, succeeding in striking everybody to the floor yet again. Wait. The guy _threw Heavy_. HOW STRONG IS THIS GUY?

Soldier crash landed on top of the other mercs.

"How do we make this maggot pay?" he grumbled, planking. Eight of the mercs magically scattered to either side as Spy suddenly floated upward with a Heavenly chorus.

"_Idea_!" he said in sing song, a cartoonish light bulb blinking into existence above his masked head. Well say it quick man, GFDGOTGS is on his way. "This guy is _very strong_," Spy mused aloud, giving the roof/sky a sidelong glance, "I wonder if he could be stronger than _Saxton Hale_…"

Realising what the plan entailed, the team quickly scarpered. In the nick of time too- as with an unearthly yell of 'WHAT!?' Saxton Hale himself smashed into the centre of the shop, having used an eagle as a parachute again.

GFDGOTGS froze in surprise at the sight of him, not really having time to wonder where he came from or where the mercs were hiding before Hale demanded;

"Are _you _the one who thinks he's stronger than me?" The guy blanched. "THOUGHT NOT, HIPPIE. I'll kill ya with _my bare hands_."

Somewhere in hiding, the fanboy in Sniper shuddered at the iconic line's use.

One uppercut later, Saxton was gone, the mercs nonchalantly moseyed back into the open, and GFDGOTGS wouldn't be bothering them anymore.

"All in all, I'd say that went well," Spy commented. The mercs murmured half hearted agreement as they trailed toward the exit. This time they had the sense to go around the automatic door and through the gaps in the wall right next to it.

After some walking and a small run in with a civvie or two, they made it to respawn and subsequently to their base. Tired beyond belief, the nine of them trudged through and finally got a sit down in the central room.

~SAID CENTRAL ROOM~

"So," Engy began glumly, "the whole 'shopping' thing didn't go to plan…"

"Wasn't all bad," Demo mused optimistically, realising with a start that he had been too tired to notice the room was still more rubble than anything.

"Yeah, cuz, we got the table, that's somethin'," Scout said, internally curious as to why this chair felt like it was made of concrete.

"An' the food shoppin' happened," Sniper added, "Anyone want cake?"

Cake was had by all.

"OOH, also," Soldier reached behind his head and pulled out a toaster, "This was embedded in my skull the entire time." Here, Pyro whistled innocently. "So we got the appliance too."

"Not to mention ve got rid of our antagonist," Medic inputted, "One of zhe many, anyhow…"

"So shopping trip WAS worth it!" Heavy concluded. Spy wanted a line;

"Well then, the only thing to do is end the story." Everyone nodded. "Pretend I said something funny, then we all laugh and end in freeze frame, okay?"

The team offered variations of affirmative, then;

"AHAHAHAHAHAHA! "

-End scene-

* * *

**I don't know. Just- don't know**

**Well thanks so much for reading! And your reviews, aw guys, your reviews! :D**

**Guests, fellow writers, everybody in between, thank you!**

**See you soon with MORE spinoffs! :p **

**-Falsie out ;)**


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